


Discourse on the likelihood of Ikea Employees being robots

by elyteracy



Category: All For The Game - Nora Sakavic
Genre: Future Fic, Humor, IKEA, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-25
Updated: 2017-12-25
Packaged: 2019-02-20 07:36:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,240
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13142040
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/elyteracy/pseuds/elyteracy
Summary: Andrew Minyard and Neil Josten VS Ikea.





	Discourse on the likelihood of Ikea Employees being robots

Ikea smells like new plastic and meatballs. It is a strange combination that Neil's never smelled before. The store is full of happy family and screaming children. He feels a bit out of place.

He ducks his head, half to hide the scars on his face, half to check the list he's made. Andrew doesn't need it obviously, but Matt and Dan were insistent he should make a list to avoid getting distracted. 

"So we need... a queen size bed, a wardrobe and two stools," he reads.

He wasn't sure why Dan and Matt thought he'd get distracted, but seeing the sheer amount of objects everywhere, most of them colorful and eye-catching, he gets it. Over the years, purchasing things just because he could has become easier, and he could probably leave with one of those cute plushies over there.

Two kids come running toward them. Surprised, he stays frozen, and the two split up, avoiding him on both sides, screaming at each other. Andrew sends him a curious look. He shakes his head. "Nothing, I've just... never bought furniture for myself before," he says.

"I told you already. A man can only have so many issues," he says. 

He walks into a reproduction of a room. It's a nice looking living room, with pictures of random people and some books on the shelf. Neil opens one of them only to discover the pages are blank.

"Do we even know where we are going?" He asks. "Because I did not find a map of this place."

Andrew shrugs. "How hard can it be to find a bed, a wardrobe, and two stools?"

As it turns out, pretty hard. Half an hour later, after getting lost in the bathroom aisle and almost fighting on whether or not they need to buy a shower mat to avoid slipping, they haven't gotten any closer of what they are supposed to buy.

Neil is holding an orange spatula and considering adding a whip to their cart when he sees it. Behind the kitchen furniture, there are the beds. 

"Oh, thank god, I never thought we'd find it," he says.

"Why next to the kitchen area?" Andrew asks, more as a general question, Neil hopes, because he has honestly no idea.

The bed area is actually pretty impressive. Neil stares at the line of beds with different mattresses on them. He looks at Andrew from the corner of his eye, and sees that Andrew is also looking at him. He leans closer and says: "Want to try them out?"

Andrew doesn't say yes but lets himself fall on the closest bed, face first. Neil joins him more gracefully, sitting on it and bouncing a little.

"Too hard," Andrew says.

The next one, Andrew jumps on it. Neil chuckles and decides to do the same. It bounces under him. "I don't think I could sleep on this one," he admits. "It's like a trampoline."

The third one is nice. They lay next to each other on their backs. "This place is a labyrinth," Andrew says. "Nothing makes sense."

"I added five things I'd never thought I'd buy to our cart, just so you know," Neil tells him. Andrew clucks his tongue, but doesn't say anything.

"Hi, can I help you?" A chirpy voice says.

An Ikea employee with a clipboard and a wide smile is looking at them. "No," Andrew says. "We can look at a bed ourselves."

"No problem!" The employee accepts. "If you need anything, don't hesitate to reach out to me or one of my colleagues!"

One the employee is a few meters away, Andrew rolls on his side. "The Ikea employees are actually robots, thoughts?"

Neil snorts. "I wouldn't even be surprised," he says. 

Andrew makes a huffing noise, and Neil grins at him. Andrew pushes his face away with one finger. "Stop looking at me like that," he grumbles.

They find a couple arguing in the bathroom section.

"Joey, I am not letting you buy this ugly as fuck carpet. This is cow skin and you want to put that on my floor!? No fucking way," the woman screams.

"Your floor? We are both paying for this apartment! I also have a right to it!" Joey argues.

"The day you aren't craving for the stupid approval of your mom, you will have a right to the decoration of the apartment," the woman shouts.

"My mom happens to have very good taste in furniture!"

"She has a stuffed raccoon in her living room! And she is a bitch!"

Joey gasps. "Miranda!"

Neil grimaces and makes his way to the next bathroom, a kid one with small hippocampi everywhere.

"It won't end well for Joey and Miranda," Andrew says, apparently amused by the situation. He'd always been an instigator at heart.

"Hopefully we won't fight over a carpet," Neil says.

They don't fight over a carpet, but they do find themselves fighting over shelves.

"Come on, Andrew, we already have a huge shelf for all your books," Neil says. "Maybe we could... sort them, don't you think?"

"No," Andrew refuses.

Neil throws his arms in the air. "One, you remember them word for word, and two, I just don't even know where we would put it."

"In the living room," Andrew says, crossing his arms.

"Where in the living room?"

"Next to the window."

Neil closes his eyes and sighs. "We don't have space next to the window, there's the plant you bought the other day."

"We can move it to the kitchen."

"You know what? Fuck it, I give up," Neil says, turning around. "Buy the shelf and see by yourself that we just don't have space once we are home."

Andrew tilts his chin up, satisfied with himself. Neil rolls his eyes and makes his way to the wardrobes, which they have finally found after an hour of turning around the store.

Neil opens the catalog of wardrobes and stares at all the drawings. Andrew joins him and makes a face.

"I am so confused," Neil says, his eyes darting from left to right.

"I don't even know what this is supposed to be," Andrew grumbles, pointing at something that may be either a small drawer or a box, or maybe a socks basket, who knows. Not him.

"Hi! Can I help you?" An Ikea employee says, startling them both.

Neil glances at Andrew and his furrowed eyebrows. He thinks it's time to cut the trip short. "Yes, we are looking to buy a wardrobe."

"Great! We have different models," she says, followed by a series of gibberish words that Neil doesn't even try to understand.

Neil blinks at her. "Why don't you show us the models instead?" He suggests.

"Yes, obviously!"

She takes them on a tour, showing them many wardrobes, ranging from the very simple to quite complicated in terms of design.

"The Ska— Sku—" Neil sighs. "The first one, the very basic, was nice."

"Great! Please follow me to the computer so that I can make the command. You'll have to go take the pieces in the basement."

"That sounds overly complicated for a dumb wardrobe," Andrew says.

"That's only because all our models are completely customizable, you see," the employee replies with a wide smile.

Andrew leans back toward Neil. "Robots, I told you," he whispers.

"I'm more and more inclined to believe you," Neil says.

She types a few things on the keyboard and turns toward them. "What color would you like the wardrobe? We have black and white."

"Black," Andrew says at the same time as Neil says, "white."

They glance at each other. "If we don't buy a new bookshelf, you can have the black wardrobe," Neil tells him.

Andrew glares at him. There's a small staring standoff. The Ikea employee seems slightly uncomfortable. "Fine," Andrew accepts. "We'll take it in black."

"Nice. How would you like the door to be? We have mirrors, glass, clear or cloudy or simple wood."

Neil glances at Andrew who only shrugs. "You are no help," he complains. "Just simple wood will be fine," he says.

"And for the handles?"

"We also have to choose the handles?"

"Yes, sir."

"Just give us the simplest you have," Neil decides, already feeling tired.

"Halfway there!" The employee announces, and Neil wonders what else there is to choose for a simple wardrobe. "Now the interior. What would you like? We have hangers or shelves, we have drawers, wood drawers, clothes baskets, boxes, or combination of all of those."

"I'm so lost," Neil admits. "Please ask my partner."

Andrew sighs. "You are an idiot," he tells Neil. "One hanger on the side and shelves on the other, plus two drawers for the bottom."

"A good choice, sir," the employee says with a smile. She finishes typing on the laptop and prints the document. She holds it up for them. "Here are the reference number of everything you need, just go to the basement and follow the signs. We recommend to first get everything you need on the top floor before you can downstairs. Have a nice day."

"I have never been so lost in my life," Neil admits, holding the piece of paper.

Andrew squints at the thing. "I don't even know what half these things means," he says.

In the end, they do manage to get their wardrobe and bed in kits, plus the two stools and an assortment of unneeded various objects, such as a breadboard, a cooking whip, a soap holder, fake roses and some cinnamon buns.

It's only when they've paid and are standing in the parking lot that they realized they cannot fit everything in the Maserati. Actually, they can barely fit anything in the Maserati.

They have to go back and ask for home delivery. When they ask for an approximate time on the day of the delivery, the woman tells them between eight am and six pm, which does not help. They leave the Ikea with Neil muttering in French something about forks and rakes, which Andrew does not get. (His French is still bad, he'd never thought it useful to learn.)

 

 

When Andrew comes back from his ice cream run, he finds Neil sitting on the floor in a tank top and shorts, staring at instructions with furrowed eyebrows. In front of him, an open package with woods panels and many screws.

"I speak six languages, and I honestly can't make sense of this," Neil mutters under his breath.

"Which one is that?"

"The wardrobe."

Andrew puts the ice cream in the freezer and joins Neil on the floor. He inspects the leaflet. He separates the different panels, checking for help on which one is supposed to go first.

He thinks he's found it. He drags it out of the box and lays it on the floor.

"Are you sure it's this one?" Neil asks. "The number of holes isn't the same as the one on the paper."

Andrew frowns. "What?" He checks and yes, there are indeed only for holes on this one and not six like the drawing on the paper. He sighs and fishes the right one.

"Give me the small wood stuff," he asks, holding out his hand.

"What wood stuff?"

"The thing that look like wood screws."

"The hell are wood screws," Neil mutters under his breath.

Andrew rubs the bridge of his nose. He stands up and gets the wood pieces by himself. He hands two to Neil. "Put them in the holes there."

They do two on each side, as indicated.

"Do we have a screwdriver?" Neil asks.

"Yes," Andrew answers, still trying to make sense of the drawings. He thinks they are supposed to screws things together, but he's honestly not sure.

"Where is it?" Neil asks, from the kitchen.

"In the cutlery drawer," Andrew answers. "With the big knives."

Neil comes back. Andrew only sees his feet, hunched over the instructions. He's only wearing flip flops. "You should wear proper shoes," he tells him. "You are gonna hurt yourself."

Neil looks at his feet, confused for a moment. "Oh, yes," he says and goes to change into a pair of snickers. "Why was the screwdriver in the cutlery drawer?" He calls from the entrance.

"Because I put it there," Andrew replies.

"Yes, I figured the screwdriver didn't hop with the knives by itself," Neil sneers. "Why'd you put it there?"

"It seemed like the most sensible place at the time."

"Whatever," Neil mutters.

After two hours, a lot of sighing and an argument that could almost have ended up as breakup fight or kitchen sex, they finally manage to finish the wardrobe.

The sun is low on the horizon. Neil and Andrew lay on the floor on their back. "Even if I could speak Swedish it wouldn't have helped."

"We still haven't done the bed," Andrew points out.

"Tomorrow," Neil grumbles. "We've slept with the mattress on the floor for a week, we can wait one more day."

Andrew turns toward Neil. His hair is curling around his temples due to sweat. "Neil," he calls.

Neil looks at him. Andrew brushes the curls off his forehead and kisses him. Neil hums in the kiss, rolling on his side and—

"Fuck!" He curses. He raises himself on one arm and finds a screw on the floor.

Andrew wrinkles his nose. "Let's take this to bed."

Neil kisses the tip of his nose. "Sounds like a plan."


End file.
